Author Archives: Gail Eastwood

About Gail Eastwood

Gail Eastwood is the author of seven Regencies that were originally published by Signet/Penguin. After taking ten years off for family matters, she has wobbled between contemporary romantic suspense and more Regency stories, wondering what century she's really in and trying to work the rust off her writing skills. Her backlist is gradually coming out in ebook format, and some are now available in new print editions as well. She is working on the start of a Regency-set series and other new projects. Stay tuned!

A Visit to Newstead Abbey, by Guest Author Camille Elliot

Updated on May 30, 2015 by Gail Eastwood

Today the Riskies welcome guest author, Camille Elliot. She’s offering a giveaway, too, so be sure to check the details at the end of her post.

Hello! My name is Camille Elliot and I’m a relatively new Regency romance author.

I’ve been reading Regencies since I was thirteen years old, but didn’t start writing them until a few years ago. For my 40^th birthday, I decided to take a “bucket list” trip to England rather than throwing a big party, and I’m so glad I went! It was the most wonderful experience I’ve ever had and it inspired some scenes in my latest Regency, The Spinster’s Christmas.

I was able to visit Lord Byron’s estate, Newstead Abbey, and it absolutely captivated me from the first sight of the ruined chapel front attached to the house.

The grounds are absolutely stunning—not as extensive as, say, Chatsworth, but beautifully cultivated. Most of the gardens were developed in the late 1800s but some of the gardens nearer to the house had been there when Lord Byron lived at Newstead.

Two of the gardens that really captivated me were the Small Walled Garden and the Rose Garden. They were originally the kitchen gardens, but were developed, I believe, in the late 1800s. The Small Walled Garden is especially beautiful with arches made of trained pear trees, and the high walls make it seem like it’s cut off from the rest of the world.

The Rose Garden is gigantic and I could see it as a wonderful place for children to play hide and seek. What was rather funny was the way the trees were sculpted. My friend, Liz Babbs, said they looked like Hershey’s kisses, but I thought they looked like giant turds.

When I wrote The Spinster’s Christmas, I went back to my memories of Newstead Abbey for a key scene in the book (in other words, a major kissing scene). The children are playing Hide and Seek in the Rose Garden, which I named the Lower Gardens, and my heroine speaks to my hero in the Small Walled Garden, which I named the Upper Gardens.

When writing the scene, I almost felt like I was back at Newstead. Sigh. I hope to go back to England soon, and back to Newstead again!

Thanks so much for visiting with us today and sharing this adventure, Camy!

Camy writes Christian romantic suspense as Camy Tang and Regency romance as USA Today bestselling author Camille Elliot. She lives in San Jose, California, with her engineer husband and rambunctious dog. She is a staff worker for her church youth group and leads one of the Sunday worship teams. Her latest novel, The Spinster’s Christmas, is now available for pre-order: http://camilleelliot.com/books/lady_wynwood_series/1_the_spinsters_christmas

This story is the first in Camy’s new series.

The Lady Wynwood series:

The pain and suffering of her short marriage eventually brought widowed Lady Wynwood emotional and spiritual peace. She is able to help her extended family members find love and happiness, but what about herself?

The Spinster’s Christmas:

Miranda Belmoore has never felt attuned to the rest of society. Her family has never understood her blunt speech and unwillingness to bow to conventional strictures, and so they have always made her feel that there is something wrong with her. Now as a poor relation in her cousin’s house, she makes plans to escape a life of drudgery and disdain from her own family members.

Naval Captain Gerard Foremont is having difficulty adjusting to life back on land, frustrated that his career has been cut short by his severely injured knee. Guilt haunts him as he sees the strain his long convalescence has had upon his parents. As they spend Christmastide with the Belmoores, he wants to help fulfill his mother’s wish to have her orphaned niece come to stay with them.

However, an enemy has infiltrated the family party, bent on revenge and determined that Twelfth Night will end in someone’s death …

Camy is offering three copies of The Spinster’s Christmas when it releases (please note it is not available yet!!) to three lucky winners who will be chosen randomly from among those who comment below. Do you have a favorite place in England you would most like to go back to visit again? If you haven’t been there, what one place is highest on your “wish to see” list? Writers, what real places have inspired scenes in your stories?

Posted in Giveaways, Guest, Places, Research, Risky Regencies, Writing | Tagged Camille Elliot, English Gardens, Newstead Abbey, Regency Romance | 18 Replies

Celebrating May Day/Beltane/Walpurgis Nacht

Updated on May 1, 2015 by Gail Eastwood

Happy May 1^st! For most of us, today is not an official holiday, but given its long history, I think it ought to be. Who’s with me? Bonfires? Dancing? Flowers? What’s not to like? In medieval times it was a huge holiday. And while the celebration of it was not prevalent among the fashionable during Regency times, many of the traditions continued to be observed in the rural villages and pockets of England, and especially in Ireland, Scotland and Wales. I’m sure in individual families, observance or lack of it varied, depending on their family roots and location. I think it is more fun to talk about than say, the opening of Trout Fishing Season today, or that today (Friday before the 1^st Monday in May) is also the traditional “private viewing day” before the start of the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition, even though that might matter more to our characters!

Celebrating this date, or the night before, has traditions in cultures and belief systems that date back into the mists of time, even before the Romans and their spring Floralia festival. The ancient Celts welcomed summer on the eve of May 1^st (which is why “Midsummer” falls on the solstice in late June), with the festival of Beltane. Early Irish texts relate that the Druids would build two fires, and that cattle would be driven between them to purify them and protect them before putting them out to summer pastures. The smoke from Beltane fires was supposed to have protective powers, so there are many traditions built around passing through the smoke, including jumping over the flames, and taking home embers or ashes to spread the luck. The fires connect symbolically to the sun, an essential ingredient for a successful agricultural and pastoral season. Wiccans celebrate Beltane, so the night’s association with witches is understandable.

The night before May 1st in Germany is Walpurgisnacht, also called Hexennacht (literally “Witches’ Night”). Celebrations usually include bonfires and dancing. There is some evidence the “Witches Night” association in Germany may be of a much later date than the Christian St Walpurga for whom the festival is named: the German folk tradition of a meeting of sorcerers and witches on May Day eve is influenced by the descriptions of witches’ sabbaths in 15th and 16th century literature, and was embraced by authors such as Faust and Thomas Mann. But Walpurgisnacht actually dates back to the 8^th century, and has more to do with us writers and fans of Regency England than you might think.

St Walpurga was English. Did you know that? She was born in Devonshire, of a family of the local aristocracy. Her father was St. Richard the Pilgrim, one of the under-kings of the West Saxons, and her mother was Winna, sister of St. Boniface, Apostle of Germany. Walpurga’s two brothers were saints, too! She was educated at Wimbourne Abbey in Dorset, before she ended up in Germany, where she and her brothers were sent to help their uncle working among the pagan Germans (who thought she was the Grain Mother come amongst them). She could read and write, and wrote a biography of her brother Winibald and also an account of his travels in Palestine. Because of these ancient works, she is often called the first female author of both England and Germany. A woman after our own hearts! Her festival is May 1^st because that is the date she was canonized by the church.

Queen_of_the_May,_in_June_-_geograph.org.uk_-_1346819

Hawthorn, the traditional Queen of the May flower.

The most common pagan-derived May Day customs practiced in various parts of Europe involve various ways of “bringing in the May” –an excuse to spend as much of the day outdoors as possible. In medieval times, May Day was a true holiday, a day of rest from labor and a day for celebrations, with much time spent in the fields and woods, searching out blooms. (That might be why May 1st was chosen in more modern times for labor protests and International Workers Day?) The “May” meant any kind of tree or bush in bloom by May 1^st. (This was easier before the calendar change of 1752, of course.) Hawthorn is the acknowledged favorite, but sycamore, birch, and rowan trees are in the running among others.

Druid at the 21 annual May Day Fairie Festival;, Spoutwood Farm, Glen Rock, PA

A “Green Man” Maypole dancer

Ways of bringing it in included bringing branches, used to decorate the homes or left on doorsteps, or an entire May Bush, or May Tree, decorated with ribbons and ornaments and displayed outside the home or in a public place. It could also mean bringing flowers, and weaving them into garlands to be displayed. In many places, especially in Germany and England, the crowning achievement was bringing a tall Maypole, to be erected as the focus for games & mummery, the selection of a May Queen, and ritualistic maypole dances honoring fertility. Considered to be a vestige of tree-worship, the intention was to bring home, or bring to the village, the blessings of the tree-spirit. When the church was unsuccessful in banning these celebrations, they tried to make the custom connected to Easter. Did you know that those Easter egg trees people use as table centerpieces connect all the way back to pagan May Trees?

Maypole dance, SCA. Can you find me? Far right, holding onto my hat!

Here is a picture of my local SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) friends (and me) dancing around a maypole on a lovely (but windy) day in May a few years ago. Did you ever do something like this in school? After declining in the 18^th century, May Day customs were resurrected by the Victorians, and these “new” traditions are now revered as old and time-honored, very common all over England.

I just found Louise Allen’s lovely post about May Day with a Cruikshank cartoon of a London procession: http://janeaustenslondon.com/2015/05/01/may-day/
Milkmaids and chimneysweeps were two groups who continued to celebrate May Day even in the Regency. I admit that I am very curious to know, why those two groups and not others? I suppose the connections of milkmaids to their cattle, and chimneysweeps to the fires, might have something to do with it. Anyone else have a theory?

Although I’m American, my family background is English & German. When I was growing up, my sister and I used to make May baskets, decorated with real and/or paper flowers and containing candy, fudge or brownies, and we would deliver them to our grandparents who lived in town, or friends and neighbors. We’d leave it on the doorstep, ring the bell and hide. A vestige of the old blooming branches and flowers left on doorsteps in ancient days? Who knew? Adding chocolate was an admirable modern improvement, don’t you think?

Sumer is icumen in,
Lhude sing, cuccu;
Groweth sed
and bloweth med,
And springth the wode anu;
Sing, cuccu! (words from a 13^th century song)

Posted in Frivolity, History, Research, Risky Regencies | Tagged Beltane, Gail Eastwood, holidays, May Day, St Walpurga, Walpurgisnacht | 5 Replies

Those Bluestocking Women

Updated on April 4, 2015 by Gail Eastwood

In Regency times, would you have been a “bluestocking”? How many times have you read about (or written) a heroine who either considered herself one, or was warned in no uncertain terms by her mother/aunt/sponsor or best friend against becoming one?

Not too long ago I was invited to join a group of Regency authors calling themselves The Bluestocking League. (A lot of authors are finding it wise to band together to help promote each other’s work.) We haven’t been very active yet, but we discovered soon after naming ourselves that another group of authors had recently formed a group called the Bluestocking Belles. You see? Bluestockings are back!! So it seemed timely to take a look at what was originally an 18^th century women’s society, and in the Regency became a (derisive) slang term for educated women with intellectual interests –who might, after all, threaten the social order!

The 18^th century, “The Age of Enlightenment,” earned the name because ideas and intellect flourished during the period. While women had few rights, two things they –could- do (and were expected to do) were socialize and engage in the arts. Salons were popular, and hostesses angled to have the most illustrious leaders of culture and literature as guests. The London salons hosted by the well-to-do and well-educated friends

Elizabeth Montagu

Elizabeth Montagu (1718-1800), Elizabeth Vesey (c.1715-91) and Frances Boscawen (1719-1805) attracted some of the greatest intellectual minds of the times, such as the writer Samuel Johnson, and artists Francis Reynolds and her brother Sir Joshua Reynolds. By mid-century these get-togethers evolved into a loosely organized network, kind of a “women’s club” that offered more than intimate gatherings for conversation, supplying mutual support, friendship and patronage for a growing pool of writers, artists, and intellectuals. Writers Hannah More and Fanny Burney, poet Anna Seward, and artist Angelica Kaufmann were regulars among many others in later years. The women, and their male guests, also advocated for education and explored options for civic and social improvements.

Most of the women portrayed as young Greek Muses in this group portrait by Richard Samuel were Bluestockings. Singer Elizabeth Ann Sheridan is in the centre. Artist Angelica Kauffman sits at the easel with writer/poet Elizabeth Carter and poet Anna Letitia Barbauld behind her. The five at right are (L-R) historian Catharine Macaulay, hostess & literary critic Elizabeth Montagu, and writer Elizabeth Griffith (all seated), and standing behind them, writers Hannah More and Charlotte Lennox. Some were much older than shown by the time the picture was exhibited in 1779. (Montagu was 61.)

The story of exactly how the network acquired the affectionately applied name of the Bluestocking Society, or the Bluestocking Circle, is debated. Blue wool stockings were commonly worn for informal or daytime dress then, with white or black silk reserved for evening or more formal occasions. The informal style (and the cross-class nature) of the salon gatherings was unprecedented and set a new style for socializing. One version of the story holds that Mrs Vesey (or Mrs Montagu), inviting the botanist Benjamin Stillingfleet to attend a salon, assured the man who had given up polite society that he was welcome to come “in his blue stockings.” Another version says Stillingfleet simply showed up wearing them. OTOH, the French version of the term (bas bleu) had actually already been in use since the 1500s. At any rate, the group adopted the name with pride. The network expanded well beyond London, and probably peaked during the 1780-90’s, when Elizabeth Montagu opened her new Portman Square home for meetings, and was hailed by Johnson as “the Queen of the Blues”. Hannah More’s poem “Bas Bleu, or the Conversation” was published in 1789.

Typically, though, as the term “bluestocking” became widely accepted as a tag for an intellectual woman, it also began to be perverted into derisive slang, belittling the very values it once stood for. The original Bluestockings were dying off at the start of the Regency, and their supportive network had suffered setbacks such as the loss of friendship between Montagu and Johnson, a scandal over patronage and money involving Montagu, More, and the poet Anna Yearsley, and later, scandalous lifestyle choices made by members like Macaulay. Ridicule replaced admiration in the eyes of society –Byron scorned them and Rowlandson did a cartoon, “The Breaking Up of the Bluestocking Club” published in 1815. In the Regency, to be a bluestocking was considered tantamount to declaring spinsterhood and rejecting society.

The original Bluestockings were the feminists of their day, ahead of their time in many of their ideas, but especially in valuing the female mind. Their moniker shows up these days in all sorts of ways, from the name of bookstores and a play, to a week-long celebration of women in education at UQ in Australia. I’m happy to be among women ready to reclaim the term and put it back into its original perspective and meaning. So, are you a bluestocking, too?

If you want to read more, there’s a great article connected to an exhibit at London’s National Portrait Gallery: http://www.npg.org.uk/whatson/exhibitions/2008/brilliant-women/the-bluestockings-circle.php, and another with great detail at https://bluestockingssociety.wordpress.com/the-blue-stocking-history/.

Also, there’s a book: Biographical Sketches of Principal Bluestocking Women, by Anna Miegon. I want to read it now! There’s also a collection of essays: Reconsidering the Bluestockings, by Nicole Pohl & Betty A. Schellenberg, and much more, of course. I think the original Bluestockings would be pleased to see how far we women have come, don’t you? Although perhaps dismayed that it took as long as it has, and that we still have more to achieve. What do you think? Please comment!

Posted in History, Reading, Regency, Research | Tagged 18th century women, Bluestockings, feminism, Gail Eastwood, women's education, women's history, writers | 17 Replies

Winner of Margaret Evans Porter’s Giveaway

Updated on March 24, 2015 by Gail Eastwood

I’m delighted to announce the winner of Margaret Evans Porter’s giveaway from her guest interview last week. Kristen H is the winner of a print copy of Margaret’s newly reissued romance, The Proposal!! Congratulations, Kristen. We’ll put Margaret in touch with you to work out the details. And thank you, everyone else, for your great comments and for participating. Margaret enjoyed visiting with us and sends her best regards to all.

Posted in Giveaways, Winners announced | 1 Reply

Margaret Evans Porter & The Proposal

Updated on March 16, 2015 by Gail Eastwood

Today the Riskies welcome guest Margaret Evans Porter! Margaret and I have been friends since early days in my career, and I was a huge fan of her work even before that. The Proposal is one of my absolute favorites among her books, so I am very excited that a new edition will be released tomorrow!! Margaret is offering a print copy of The Proposal to a randomly chosen winner among those who comment by the end of this week, so please share your thoughts with us below after visiting here. And read on to find out about a new project she has coming out next month, as well!

Margaret Evans Porter

Margaret is the author of 11 novels and 2 novellas published in hardcover, paperback, digital editions, and in translation. She earned the Best New Regency Author award from Romantic Times Magazine with her first book, and later novels received multiple award nominations. She has also published nonfiction, poetry, and her photography, and is a trained actress who has worked on stage and in film and television. All this and she is also a historian and an avid gardener! But I should let HER tell you.

What’s the premise of The Proposal?

A: In 1797, Sophie Pinnock, a botanical artist and the widow of a famous landscape designer, is employed by the Earl of Bevington to alter the ground of his newly inherited castle in Gloucestershire. She would much prefer to restore the gardens to their original state than replace them. After many years living in Portugal, her employer has returned to England to claim his title.

Where did the idea for this particular story come from?

Margaret’s garden

A: It was the dead of winter in New England, the world was buried under snow–much like this winter! My coping mechanism was to design new rose beds that would feature historic period roses from Medieval times to the Regency and Victorian eras. I had recently spent time at a Gloucestershire castle. I ended up with a 2-book contract as well as an expanded garden!

Where did you turn for research?

A: I had already amassed a collection of historic gardening guides and price lists from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuties. My mother is a rose gardener, so I was raised with historic roses and books about them. On trips to England I visited intact gardens from earlier times.

What aspects of the research itself most intrigued you?

A: There was a raging debate about landscape design at that very time, when Humphrey Repton was altering many formal gardens to conform with his more “natural” style–popular with some people, and criticised by others. I was able to rely on primary sources, like the Red Books that Repton created for his clients (Sophie provides her clients with Blue Books!) And I’m always happy when I can wander through English gardens, so that was particularly appealing to me.

Do you have a favorite scene in this book?

A: I managed to include a scene in which Sophie debates Humphrey Repton himself, because–quite conveniently–he had clients in the neighborhood.

What would you say is “risky” about this book?

A: It seems “risky” to us nowadays, the concept of a female businesswoman in the late 18th century or Regency. But there is so much precedent! Many a widow, through financial necessity or entrepreneurial desire, took on responsibility for her late husband’s businesses. I think it’s a disservice to these women to bury the record of their achievements, and in some cases their innovations–Mrs. Eleanor Coade, who developed Coade stone, Hester Bateman the Silversmith, Rolinda Sharples the artist, Mrs. Sarah Baker the theatre proprietress who developed the theatres of southeast England. These are the notable names, but how many more must there have been that we do not know?

Another aspect of “risk” concerns opium addiction, and to a lesser extent, attitudes and suspicions about sexual orientation. Both of which have an effect upon the secondary mystery plot.

How long have you been writing?

A: I’ve been writing stories since I could hold a crayon in my fist. I became a publisher-editor-author at age 9 or 10 when I founded a class newspaper. My family is packed with writers, so it wasn’t an unusual path for me to follow. My mother, who taught me to read quite young, says she always knew I would be a writer.

What aspects of your own personality show up in your stories?

Rose from Margaret’s Garden

I’m everywhere. I create gardens and grow roses–so does Sophie in The Proposal. I performed on stage for many years, and studied dance–I’ve written novels featuring an actress, a dancer, and an opera singer. Like Oriana in Improper Advances, I play the mandolin. I mine the places in Britain or Ireland where I’ve studied, lived and/or travelled and use them as settings for my stories. My dogs turn up in books as members of my characters’ households.

Do you find that your training in theater is helpful to you as a writer?

A: It’s immensely helpful, in a variety of ways. Performing period plays immersed me in the idiom of past times, I was speaking dialogue uttered by the people who lived in the eras about which I write. From a very young age I was required to do intensive character biographies, creating backstories for the people I was portraying–this often required in-depth research into social customs, education, upbringing, styles of speech, popular books and music. And of course I was wearing costumes–corsets, petticoats, full skirts, strange shoes–and carrying fans and having my hair dressed and so on. Those experiences were extremely valuable, as you might imagine!

Which book, if any, was the most difficult for you to write, and why?

I would say my new historical biographical novel, A Pledge of Better Times, for several reasons. It is entirely fact-based, all the characters were real people of the late Stuart court–monarchs and aristocrats. Historical events provided the structure, the research was intense and took place over many years between other commitments. (For example, my productivity suffered a little during my 2 terms in the state legislature. But some sections of the novel were written surreptitiously during boring floor debates!) I don’t remember that any of my Regencies or historicals were difficult to write, although I did have to manage a very quick turnaround on an option book proposal while visiting friends in England. Almost every character in that book, Improper Advances, except the hero and heroine, were historical persons, so my fictional story needed to tie in with historical reality.

You now have a second website (www.margaretporter.com) for your mainstream historical novels, featuring real people from history. Your April release, A Pledge of Better Times, is the first of these. Tell us a little bit about this new direction in your writing?

A: In my youth I read many YA biographical historical novels, and my ambition to write mainstream historical novels dates from that time. It took a long time for the right story to find me–that of Lady Diana de Vere, and of Charles Beauclerk, 1st Duke of St. Albans (bastard son of King Charles II and actress Nell Gwyn). It was sparked by some genealogical research, and caught fire after I became acquainted with a direct descendant of theirs. I spent years carrying out the research all round London–at Kensington Palace and Hampton Court and the Tower–as well as in Holland at The Hague and Paleis Het Loo. And Versailles. This book also features the development of formal gardens!

A Pledge of Better Times, will be available in print and as an ebook in April. It has just been named one of the “Books to Read in 2015” by the Book Drunkard blog–very exciting.

Where can readers go to get in touch or learn more about your books?

Website: www.margaretevansporter.com
http://www.facebook.com/AuthorMargaretEvansPorter
@MargaretAuthor on Twitter.

Risky readers, don’t forget to post a comment if you’d like a chance to win a print copy of The Proposal! Margaret Evans Porter, thanks so much for visiting with us today!

The Proposal:

When a lonely young widow and a mysterious earl clash over a neglected castle garden, suspicion and secrets threaten a blossoming love.
“Part romance, part mystery, a highly entertaining read.” –M.K. Tod, author of Lies Told in Silence
“Very sensual…lush in detail. Her characters have as much depth as the settings, and the gardens provide a wonderful backdrop for a tender love story.” –Affaire de Coeur
“Decidedly different…totally believable and deeply heartfelt.” –Rendezvous

Print on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Proposal-Margaret-Evans-Porter/dp/0990742091

Kindle on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UKI0UAC

Posted in Giveaways, Guest, Interviews, Reading, Regency, Research, Writing | Tagged A Pledge of Better Times, English Gardens, landscape design, Margaret Evans Porter, Regency, Romance, The Proposal | 25 Replies